The Babes Who Were Stolen Away

NOTE: This text was recopied
directly from a typewritten copy in the archives of the Blue Ridge Institute.
James Taylor Adams (1892-1954) kept typewritten copies of the folklore
he and others collected during the last thirty years of his life, while
he lived in Wise County, VA. Typographical errors in the original,
including the misspelling in the title below, have not been corrected, except for a few obvious
errors in spacing. One apparent error in a pronoun has been corrected
in square brackets in the first stanza. For details on other tales about
lost and unfortunate children, see
The Babes in
the Woods - and - The Two Lost Babes - and - Hansel and Gretel.

James M. Hylton

35

Wise, Virginia.

(Folk Ballads)

Lines

Related to
this Writer March 23, 1942, Wise, Virginia, by Mrs. Cornelia Ann (Carter)
Robbins, aged 66 years of age and the daughter of Asbury Carter one of the
older residents of the Glamorgan section near Wise, Va. She has already been
of help to this writer in the way of Songs etc. During an interview with her
in her home in East Wise this date she recited to me this old
Religious-sort-of Ballad. One that is an old-timer in
every respect. She has read it from an old book she has in her
possession now.

"The Babes Who Were Stollen Away"

There was a lady, and
a lady was she

And children–she
had three.

She sent them away to
the North Country

To learn their Grammeree.

The[y] hadn't been
there but a very little while,

Till death, sweet
death, came hastening along,

And stole these babes away.

II

There is a King in
Heaven

Who wears a starry
crown.

Pray send me down, my
three little babes,

Tonight or in the morning soon.

She looked out her
window and saw

Her three little
babes a-coming,

Come running to their
mother's home.

III

Go fix a table in the
little black room,

And on it place bread
and wine;

Come eat and drink of
mine.

Mama, we don't want
your bread

Nor Mama
do we want your wine;

For yonder stands our
Savior dear, unto Him we must asign.

IV

Go fix a bed in the
little back room,

On it put
clean-washed sheets,

And on that put a
Golden spread

For my three little babes a bed.

Take it off, take it
off, said the oldest one

Take it off, take it
off, said she,

For the chickens will
soon crow for day.

V

Take it off, take it
off, said the next oldest one,

Take it off, take it
off, said she

For yonder stands our
Saviour dear, unto him we must asign.

Go dig our grave both
wide and deep, a marble stone at the head,

And cold clay at one foot.

For tears, sweet
tears, that our Mother shed,

Hath wet the winding sheet on our bed.

[JTA-9455]

Replacement photocopy made by BRI, 9/1992

copyright 2007 U
of Virginia's College at Wise/Blue Ridge Institute of Ferrum College
all rights reserved